Our team here Monroe Heating & Air takes a lot of pride in being able to offer members of our community the best home heating equipment and services in the local market at prices that work with all types of budgets.
Having been in the HVAC industry for so long, we are all too familiar with how easily those big winter storms can knock out the power and leave us without heat.
While there might not be a lot we can do about the electricity components, we can at least suggest some steps you can take to stay as safe and as warm as possible until help arrives.
Steps We Suggest Taking When the Heat Goes Out
Things You Should Do:
- Call your electric provider immediately to notify them if the power has gone out and it’s cold outside. If you know that someone has called already, such as your neighbors, call anyways. A lot of utility companies prioritize which areas to respond to first based on the total number of callers. In other words, “the squeaky wheel gets the grease.”
- If you have a standby generator, use it to restore the more basic and essential appliances, such as space heaters and anything else you deem necessary while you wait for your power company to send someone out. While you’re waiting for things to go back online, exercise caution and follow the safety guidelines for your generator — like never running it inside or near any open windows that would enable exhaust or fumes to get inside. If you don’t have a generator for emergencies like these, you should consider investing in one for situations like these.
- Be mindful of where you place your space heaters. You need to make sure they’re firmly planted on level flooring with a safe distance surrounding them. This also means keeping things away that might be flammable like boxes, fuel, trash, clothes, debris, curtains and drapes. Whenever you leave the room, make sure you always turn off your space heaters if you don’t expect to be needing it.
- If you have children in the home, make sure they are aware that they should not touch space heaters or play around them.
- Grab some extra clothing layers in the home. Bundle up! If you have kids, bundle them up! Gather your hats, scarves and gloves.
- If your home has a gas or wood fireplace, make sure the flue is open and the chimney is open and fully functional before lighting a fire. Moreover, only use the fire when you’re home.
- Give us a call right away if the reason for your loss of heat is not related to a power loss.
Things You Should Not Do
- While it might seem tempting to improvise when the heat goes out and it’s cold outside, you should never use anything to heat your home that wasn’t made specifically to do just that and has been verified by a professional as being safe and effective. This includes trying to use household appliances like grills or turning up your oven and leaving it open. Not only is this a fire hazard, but it can also create dangerous fumes.
- As much as humanly possible, try to avoid opening your refrigerator or freezer while the power is out. Doing so not only lets cold air out into your home, but it can also make food spoil faster. You need to keep the insides of these as cold as possible to prevent your food from spoiling too quickly so conserve what little bit of cold you have left inside.
- This one might seem obvious. Nonetheless, you want to try to avoid getting wet in any way. If you get wet, it’s going to complicate things and take longer to get warm. Plus who knows how long you’re going to go until you can use your washer and dryer.
Lose your heat? Call us right away!
With all that said, we truly hope these tips of “do’s” and “don’ts” help you stay warm and helps doesn’t take too long to arrive to restore power. If you would like a trusted, trained professional to look at your heating equipment when the power is restored, call Monroe Heating & Air today at (513) 540-4890, or schedule an appointment now by clicking here!
